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London creaks under Sadiq no‑Khan‑do

Sadiq Khan is a self-aggrandising incompetent who has failed to fulfil his promises, has alienated his colleagues and now won’t take ownership of the Crossrail fiasco, says Andrew Gilligan

Sadiq Khan takes a ride on the Crossrail line, which had been due to open this monthJONATHAN BRADY

The Sunday Times, December 16 2018, 12:01am

When historians come to write about the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan — assuming any would bother — they could do worse than look at the month of June 2018.

We now know this was when a 51-page report from the consultants Jacobs was completed, detailing cost overruns on Crossrail, the capital’s new east-west railway, and speaking for the first time of the risk that it might “open late”: problems that have since grown to a year or more’s delay, and a deficit of more than £2bn.

On the streets, June was the month that new figures showed a 30% annual rise in robberies including muggings and an 18% increase in knife crime, with about 90 people stabbed or slashed every week. At City Hall,…

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